#28: NPI Concierge. Online Appointment Scheduling Made Easy

#28: NPI Concierge. Online Appointment Scheduling Made Easy

In this episode of Dental Marketing Mastery, we introduce NPI Concierge, our new software that allows new and existing patients to schedule dentist appointment online from your website, their social media pages, or their insurance provider’s website. You can learn more about NPI Concierge on our website at http://www.dentalwebcontent.com/concierge_patient_scheduling.html

Existing patients, specifically recare and overdue recare, can make an appointment when it is convenient for them, without making a phone call

The history of NPI Concierge

Uses YOUR scheduling rules: Dentists DON’T give away control of their dental appointment scheduling as patients can only schedule based on the criteria you set

Online marketing opportunities with this software — paid CPC campaigns that lead prospective patients directly into scheduling an appointment

How does NPI Concierge integrate with practice management software?

Podcast Transcription:

Hello, and welcome once again to the Dental Marketing Mastery series. This podcast is brought to you by DentalWebContent.com and New Patients Incorporated. I’m Howie Horrocks, the Founder of New Patients Incorporated, along with me once again, as my friend and partner and the President of New Patients Incorporated, Mark Dilatush.

Howie: Hello, everybody. Welcome to our podcast once again. And I’ve got my buddy as usual Mark Dilatush on the other end of the line here. And today, we’re going to talk about a new solution that New Patients incorporated has come up with for a very sticky problem that Dentists have. I mean, that’s sort of our business, it’s been our business for 27 years is to figure out solutions to problems that dental practices have. Right Mark?

Mark: Absolutely. In Spain, but in particular, the problems of patient acquisition, patient quality, and, you know, that always spins itself off into practice management. tentacles, in all directions, but for the most part patient acquisition. And this new product, the name of it is NPI concierge. Anybody that’s been to Las Vegas to a hotel knows what a concierge is, is someone who makes a reservation for you. If you haven’t figured out by now, NPI concierge connects your dental office website with your practice management software. It is powered by a company name, LocalMed.

For I don’t know how long now what I’m going to say part time over the last two or two and a half, three years, I’ve been looking for a solution to all of the new patient phone calls that hit our client offices during days or hours of a day that they are not there to answer the phone. And those new patient phone calls go to a voicemail and basically it’s a hang up at that point. It’s a 33 second phone call, with a hang up. I’ve been looking for a solution to that problem. There are some that dentists can use internally.

But this one gives an advantage not only to new patients who want to make their appointment now. Even if you’re not in your physically in your office or answering your phones, it gives your existing patients specifically your recare and specifically you’re overdue recare existing patients a tremendously wonderful advantage and opportunity to schedule dentist appointment online without maybe I mean, maybe they work all day just like you do. Right?

They come home at 5:30. You’re not open, they want to make their appointment, but they can’t. They get your voicemail and they try to leave a message what have you, okay, well, this way, they just log on make your appointment or already your patient. Now, traditionally, I can go back to Geez, probably a year and a half or almost two years ago, a guy named Tom from LocalMed called me and he started talking to me about this, the solution. And I thought to myself, you know, I’ve been in dentistry for 26 years, I can’t imagine a dentist giving up control of their schedule.

Howie: Yeah, that’s their big fear. Right?

Mark: That’s their gigantic fear. Right?

Howie: Justifiably.

Mark: So,

Howie: I might add, I mean, why do you want to turn over your schedule to strangers?

Mark: More likes. Exactly you don’t. Right? So you picture like Indo four in a row, you know? Yeah, yeah, I just saw make some kind of insane, you know, schedule and, and those, you know, horror movie sounds, we, you know, the guys swinging a knife behind you, you know, just terrible. And that’s what I’m agreeing with everyone listening to this podcast on my initial review of this, I thought exactly the same thing. I basically said, Tom, you know, thanks for calling me, you know, not really interested because I don’t really believe dentists are ever going to let, you know, there’s their schedule, be manipulated by patients, right? So about six months or a year goes by, and a guy named Tom calls me back.

And he says, Hey, Mark, I want you to take a look at this thing again. Geez, Tom, nothing really happened to me in the last year to convince me that dentists are going to want or this is bad, this is even a good idea. Right? Well, they had done more work on their product have done more integrations with more practice management software. And done this is the key part done deeper, more refined real time integrations with their product, right.

Anybody that knows me knows my practice management software background, right? So I’m intimately familiar with the software out there, and with how dentists use it? And, I thought to myself, I said, Well, alright, if these guys have what they say they have, this would be awesome. But then, of course, the skeptical side of me came in and said, How many times have companies pitched me on a solution for our customers? And it and it and it stunk, right? Right Howie? Like,

Howie: Right.

Mark: Like 10 out of 11 times, right?

Howie: Yeah.

Mark: Okay, Tom, I’ll listen to you again. Right? So we get on the phone, we get on a meeting. And we go through it. And I’m for everyone listening here, here’s the takeaway from this 30 minute podcast. Okay, cuz I know the questions you’re going to ask. So I’m going to give you the answers before you even ask the question. Here’s the answer to all your questions.

Howie: Your psychic Mark.

Mark: I am, I’m psychic as heck because I, I’ve had all these questions already. Right? Here’s the answer to all your concerns. It uses your dental appointment scheduling rules. That’s the answer. So if you ask me the question, what about kids? Kids don’t take as much time, you know, for their exam and cleanings. Is it going to allow kids going to give kids a whole hour and you know, it uses your scheduling rules. Well, what if the doctor is not supposed to be in? Or what if the doctor likes to have all high, high revenue procedures in the morning. What if we block or skip, it uses your schedulers’ rules. Ok?

So, this is where it went from a good idea, a decent idea to being an incredibly viable, wonderful tool for your dental office. Okay, is once they completed all that work, all that programming work, to make it us your rules, your blocks, your columns, your providers, your hygienists, your time units with your scheduler exactly the way you set it up. All it is, is it an extension. So now you put that extension out on your website for your patients to use, for new patients to use. Let me take it one step further. Because this is really where it really gets cool.

Actually, two or three steps further. So the first step is, I want new patients to be able to book an appointment with you when they’re interested, whether you’re open or not. That’s, that’s the first benefit. Okay, I’m going to see those new patient calls that are dropped, go from 20% to 15%. Bam, more than more than pays for itself, like 10 times over every month, right? So that’s, that’s the first thing I want.

The second thing I want is I want I want your established patients, especially the overdue ones, to have the opportunity to make their appointments, when it’s convenient for them to make an appointment. You already know them you already have a file for them. The system is going to verify they exist as a patient, it’s going to schedule dentist appointment online with the for the right patient in the right column for the right day for the right time, for the right number of units for that procedure, okay. You could be sleeping, you could be playing tennis.

Ever, almost every office manager right now is listening to this is their eyes and ears, their ears are perking up, because they’re the ones that have to have all these conversations. You won’t have to have as many of these conversations anymore. Now the third level, which is really intriguing, is are those complimentary console’s for the highly profitable niches in dentistry,

Howie: Like implants and Invisalign, and

Mark: dental implants and Invisalign consult, sleep apnea consult, any complimentary look, and let’s just see if you’re a candidate, right? Let’s just say if you’re a candidate, well now take it another step forward. Well, what if you were doing a PPC campaign, we manage PPC campaigns, we manage PPC campaigns through Google through social media. What if you’re doing an Invisalign campaign in Facebook right now, and you’re just saying you’re putting Facebook boost out to a 50 mile radius and part of your landing page makes it available to them to schedule dentist appointment online. You can’t control when people look at their Facebook page. It could be Wednesday evening at nine. So mom goes in fires up her Facebook page looks to clear liners and goes Yes, I heard about those.

Let me take a look and see reads what the landing page says and it says complimentary initial consult. You know, click here to schedule dentist appointment online. And when she clicks there and to schedule her initial console. It’s complimentary. And she selects that item and goes out and the system goes out and looks for the first time day and the first time or the first days and times excuse me that that console opening is available in your provider in your column and your schedule, the way it’s set up according to your rules. that’s those are the only options it gives the website visitor website visitors selects one of them confirm the email, confirm the appointment and give you plenty of time to follow up maybe two or three days to follow up and, and do some intake before they come in.

Howie: Yeah. And that’s so cool. Because up until the practice chooses to do the follow up. There’s no humans involved.

Mark: Yeah, I mean,

Howie: we get that automated.

Mark: Yeah, we get that question all the time to what, what about insurance, I have to know exactly what insurance they have. And I have to have all their numbers and all their paperwork and all their stuff, right? Well just set up the rule with concierge and just say don’t offer any openings umm, within 36 hours of right now. That gives you three days, you’re going to get notified every time somebody makes an appointment from your website anyway, it gives you three days to follow up with them, get their intake, get their insurance information, make sure they’re a good match for your practice, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You have plenty of time.

So as you have this conversation with dentists and the and the scheduling coordinators, one by one by one, all their fears melt away. And they sit back and there’s this aha moment where they sit back and go. You mean it works off of my scheduling rules? Yeah. Yeah. You mean? You mean it’s not like the solution that came with my, how do I put this, came with my internal marketing, communication, email texting software? It’s nothing like that. This one will double or triple book or this one doesn’t. You know, this one is real time. This one doesn’t sink once a day and leave you with, you know, double or triple booked

Howie: Oh Oh Oh and wait, and how about the patient who shows up thinking they have an appointment, and they don’t?

Mark: And they don’t, right. doesn’t do that either. Right. Right. It’s

Howie: How awful is that?

Mark: It’s literally an extension of your schedule using your rules, literally. Right? So anyway, so in the two and a half years, you know, I’m going to give this guy Tom brown a lot of credit, because even though you know, a couple years ago, we didn’t really see eye-to-eye, I didn’t think it was going to go anywhere.

I certainly didn’t think dentists were going to want to do it. And I wasn’t interested in anything that dentists, you know, wasn’t going to benefit the dentist. I give them credit for being for following up and saying, Hey, Mark, we done an awful lot to this product, take a look at it now. Here’s my report. It works. It it works and here’s the other great thing about it is about a 15 minute fact finding conversation and then about 48 hours break, and then another 10 to 15 minute conversation with the person that does your scheduling in your office. It’s installed, It’s working.

Howie: That’s the dental practice time commitment?

Mark: Yeah, about Yeah, I’d say I’d say I’d say 15 minutes fact finding first time and then about two days or three days goes by because they got a program according to your rules, right. And then another 15 to 20 minutes during the absolute install, when they make sure all their they set up all the rules according to the way you want to do, and then it’s live that they produce the widget, the widget goes on your website. Here’s the other cool thing about this. You know, I I’m most excited about this schedule dentist appointment online widget appearing on your website, right? We know how much web traffic we generate to our client sites, right?

Literally, right we know, we know exactly how many impressions we’re generating to our clients sites. And we believe a good solid percentage will schedule dentist appointment online, we don’t think the numbers going to get smaller. We’re very sure the number of people booking online is going to go up. Otherwise, what why would, why would sites like Uber and Open Table, why would any of those other sites exist? If people weren’t getting more and more and more used to reserve big things online? When was the last time anybody listening to this podcast called a travel agent?

Howie: Do they have those guys anymore?

Mark: I know it’s funny, isn’t it? Right? Right, okay. But, but it’s, see it’s not just the cool factor. I wouldn’t do this if it was just a cool factor. I would do it if it was going to save 10% of those miss calls every month because I know how much revenue that our clients are missing by not answering their phones, right?

Howie: Oh, man that that? Well, yeah, that’s been our pet peeve forever, you know, 20%, or there about. But people say more of calls go unanswered. Nobody, no human is there to respond. So forget it, you know, this is a great way to increase the power and the punch and the ROI of your marketing without spending any more money.

Mark: Yeah, and for the folks who listen to our podcast may or may not be our clients. You don’t have to be our clients. It doesn’t have to it doesn’t, it’ll work with any website. You can just call an order it just for this this from just us. And that’ll be the you know, you could just be our customer, you know, for this product. Um, but it absolutely will more than pay. It’s 100. It’s 100. And no, it’s $99 to set up and $99 a month.

Howie: Wow

Mark: So if we get one additional new patients what every three or four months, right? Yeah, from allowing them to schedule dentist appointment online. everything after that is total and pure gravy.

Howie: Yeah.

Mark: Oh, now here’s the other cool part about this just little widget. A widget is electronic code, it’s basically your account. That code can be placed anywhere. So are, the most obvious place you would put it is on your website, any website developer can install this widget in 41 seconds. Okay, this is not difficult to install.

Once you put it on your website, that’s not it, you can actually install this widget on your business on your Facebook page. You can install this widget if you’re participating with insurance companies, you can give the insurance company this widget and they can put it on your listing on their insurance when you’re on their provider list. So if a if a patient, let’s say there and plead by bowing, and they go to their dental insurance, and they type in providers, or they click providers, you’re if you’re a provider for their insurance, you’re going to come up on their list, but you’re going to have a little bit of have a different spin on your list. Because your listing is going to have a little icon that says schedule dentist appointment online now.

Soon as they click that it goes right from the insurance website, right to your website and opens up the appointment type dialog box. So this is not just a widget for your website. It’s not a scheduling online scheduling just for your website, you can put this webs this widget on social media, and if your insurance carrier participates on the insurance website, so and the number of things you can put it on is not going down the number of places you can put it is going up. So over time it’s going to actually increase in value not decrease in value.

So for all those reasons. That’s why we brought on NPI concierge. Again, it’s $99 to install, $99 a month. There are no annual contracts ever. If you don’t like it, tell us, you’re out. We doubt anybody’s ever going to do that. Once its installed and once you get your first taste of a patient showing up in your schedule filling a hole that you didn’t even talk to. Um, that’s pretty much ends the debate. But,

Howie: That’s pretty cool.

Mark: Yeah, so that’s NPI concierge. If you have any questions about it, you can always go to our website, or you can just give us a call direct and we’ll be happy to walk you through it.

Howie: Awesome. Well, that that pretty much wraps this up. I know that there’s going to be some questions and we’ll be glad to feel them. Contact us through the usual channels or website or email or phone. And, boy, this is good news. This is great news. Thanks for explaining all that mark.